Nats News

The weather went from being a real challenge on Tuesday to being a really good flying day on Wednesday. Control Line (CL) Navy Carrier enjoyed light winds all day with reasonable temperatures that allowed for some good flights. Where weather dominated the late-day competition on Tuesday, Wednesday saw equipment problems keeping some contestants grounded and preventing others from completing their flights.

Wednesday turned out to be a much more successful race day than the previous two. Quickie Rat had six Open entries and two Juniors. Everyone scored a presentable race time. FAI racing requires fixed pilot and pitman combinations, whereas in AMA racing, the entry is based solely on who enters the model.

Today we started the first day of 426. The plan is to fly six rounds of qualifying.

The qualifying/finals format presents different strategies for competing, and many are just trying to make the finals. It proves to be fun and engaging for all. The two final rounds of qualifying will be flown on Wednesday morning.

Today we started out with Slow Survivable Combat (SSC). George Pritchett was generous enough to loan a couple of planes to Nats newcomer Andrew Shkolik. That gave us four pilots to battle it out up in the sky.